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Hi, this is Steve Sande for Apple World Today, and this is the AWT News Update for August 3, 2016.

We haven’t had any really good rumors this week about the iPhone 7 or 6SE or whatever it’s going to be called, so let’s remedy that right now. The good old “unspecified supply chain sources” are telling DigiTimes that the iPhone 7 will have 3 GB of RAM instead of the 2 GB in current models. This move, if correct, will boost the entire memory industry as production cuts this year have resulted in a rather limited supply of DRAM chips and higher prices. DigiTimes notes that chip manufacturers Macronix International and Powertech Technology have increased earnings estimates citing increased demand from unspecified smartphone makers.

Yesterday, Apple announced that two Canadian institutions had added support for Apple Pay. Those were Scotiabank subsidiary Tangerine and the President’s Choice Financial MasterCard. Today Apple announced the addition of 23 smaller banks and credit unions in the United States to the large list of Apple Pay providers. At this time, Apple Pay has about 12 million active users per month, and the number is growing steadily.

While much of the early hoopla about Pokémon GO has died off, there are still a lot of people playing the game. But you can’t count Detroit Lions guard Larry Warford in the ranks of dedicated players. The Detroit Free Press reports that he’s stopped playing the augmented reality game because he’s convinced that the game is controlling minds. To quote Warford, “I was walking down Mill Avenue in Tempe, Arizona, pretty much on Arizona State’s campus. I was walking down and literally everyone that was on their cell phone walking down the same street was playing Pokémon GO. I was looking at their screens and it was about 30, 40 people. It was a bunch of people playing it, and I was like, ‘I don’t like this’. I deleted it it because I was like, ‘This is some mind-control stuff’ I don’t like it. CNET writer Chris Matyszczyk said that he contacted Pokémon GO’s creator Niantic Labs to ask if there were any mind control parameters in the game, and the company didn’t immediately respond… We’ll leave it up to listeners to decide whether or not they feel like their minds are being controlled by the game, but it could explain a lot about this year’s presidential election cycle…

If you’re not a member of Team AWT yet, we have a reason for you to sign up today. Apple World Today is giving away a Drobo 5Dt RAID array with five 2TB drives. This is a super fast RAID box with twin Thunderbolt 2 ports, 128GB of SSD cache, and it’s expandable as drive capacities grow. The giveaway was announced in a post on AWT this week and the prize is worth almost $1200. Join Team AWT for just $5 per month and you’ll be eligible not only to receive all of the extras — like a weekly patron podcast and biweekly newsletter — that come along with membership, but get into this giveaway as well.

That’s all for today; We’ll be back tomorrow afternoon with another edition of the AWT News Update.

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Established February 9, 2015, Apple World Today is a resource for all things Apple and beyond. AWT publishes news stories, credible rumors and how-to's covering a variety of topics daily. As a trusted tech blog, AWT provides opinion and analysis on the news in addition to the facts. Our staff consists of experienced writers who live and breathe Apple products every day.

Apple World Today is a trusted source for news, information and analysis about Apple and its products. Our readership is made up of new users, intermediate and business users and advanced users. In addition, we cover topics relevant to niches like developers, designers and others.

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